Outwitting Our Nerves eBook

=Loss of Appetite.= A nervous patient with a good
appetite is “the exception that proves the rule.”
The neurotic is usually under weight and often complains
that he feels satiated almost as soon as he begins
to eat. Loss of appetite may, of course, mean
that the body is busy combating toxins in the blood,
but in a nervous person it usually means a symbolic
loss of appetite for something in life, a struggle
of the personality against something for which he
has “no stomach.” Psycho-analysis
often reveals the source of the trouble, and a little
bullying helps along the good work. By simply
taking away a harmful means of expression, we may
often force the subconscious mind to find a better
language.

SUMMARY

Since the stomach seems to be an organ which is much
better fitted to care for food than to care for a
depressing emotion or a false idea, it seems far more
sensible to change our minds than to keep enlarging
our list of eatables which are taboo.

And since most indigestion is in very truth nothing
more nor less than an emotional disturbance, worked
up by fear, anger, discontent, worry, ignorance, suggestion,
attention to bodily functions which are meant to be
ignored, love of notice and the conversion of moral
distress into physical distress, the best diet list
which can be furnished to Mr. Everyman in search of
health must read something like this:

MENU

Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday,
Friday, Saturday,
Sunday

A Calm Spirit
Plenty of Good Cheer
A Varied Diet Commonsense
Good Cooking
Judicious Neglect of Symptoms
Forgetfulness of the Digestive Process
A Little Accurate Knowledge
A Determination to
BE LIKE FOLKS

CHAPTER XI

In which we relearn an old trick

THE BUGABOO OF CONSTIPATION

POPULAR SUPERSTITIONS

In line with the taboos connected with the taking
of food are the ceremonials attendant upon its elimination.
Taking anxious thought about functions well established
by nature is a feature of conversion-hysteria, the
displacement of emotional desire from its psychic
realm into symbolic physical expression. Whatever
other symptoms nervous people may manifest, they are
almost sure to be troubled with chronic constipation.
It is true that there are many constipated people
who do not seem to be nervous and who resent being
classed among the neurotics. Everybody knows that
the occasional individual who has difficulty in swallowing
his food is nervous and that the, trouble lies not
in the muscles of his throat but in the ideas of his
mind. But very few people seem to realize that
the more common individual who makes hard work of
that other simple process—­elimination of
his intestinal waste matter—­is suffering
from the same kind of disturbance and giving way to
a nervous trick. When all the facts are in, the
constipated person will have hard work to clear himself
of at least one count on the charge of nerves.